


You Can't Always Get What You Want (You Get What You Need)

by Reindrops



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Doctor Clarke, F/M, Neighbors, mentions of marijuana
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-03-08 08:16:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13454157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reindrops/pseuds/Reindrops
Summary: Prompt: Clarke and Bellamy are neighbors in the same apartment complex. Bellamy has a loud dog, and Clarke’s roommate likes to get stoned. The two are highly annoyed with each other and keep putting notes on the others’ doors.





	You Can't Always Get What You Want (You Get What You Need)

“Listen to it!” Clarke hissed at Monty, her roommate, who was lounging on the couch. Clarke was pacing near the door, listening to their neighbor’s dog across the hall bark incessantly. What could possibly be setting him off so much?

“Oh, trust me, I can hear it” Monty agreed, though he didn’t take his eyes off of the soccer match they were supposed to be watching. When it was clear Clarke wasn’t going to be joining him anytime soon, he muted the TV. “Go over there and say something if it’s bothering you so much,” he told her as he turned in his seat and faced his friend.

That stopped Clarke in her tracks. She thought on it before shaking her head, “I don’t really want to face him in person. I just want to be able to say my peace and be done with it. If I go over there, he's just going to get defensive and argue with me about it.” She finally left the door and joined Monty back on the couch.

“Write him a note?” Monty suggested. “Tape it to his door where he’ll see it.” 

Clarke nodded, thinking of what she’d write. “Yeah, that’s a good idea. I can do that.”

There’s not a whole lot Clarke knew about her neighbor; she doesn’t even know his name. She’d seen him a few times when she left for work in the morning or when she was just coming home. She’d seen a handful of different women coming and going from his apartment, too. So she figured he was a lady’s man. She could see why. He was the very definition of tall, dark, and handsome. His hair was dark and curly, freckles dotting his skin, and he clearly worked out.

She’d be lying if she said she hadn’t drawn him once or twice. He was every artist’s dream.

Clarke had no idea what he did for a living or if he even had a car. The only other thing she knew about him was that he had a big, loud dog that loved to bark at all hours of the night. Monty was a heavy sleeper, so it never seemed to bother him as much as it did Clarke, who woke at the slightest sounds. The dog was fairly new, as the barking had only started about a month or so ago. But it’d been long enough to have disrupted her routine. 

A note would be the perfect way to converse with him. She’d say her peace and be done with it. If nothing changed, she’d get their landlord involved. As Monty turned the volume back up on the game now that Clarke was satisfied, Clarke hurried into her room to grab a notebook. Plopping herself back on the couch, she pulled her blonde tresses back into a high ponytail, out of her face and began working on her note.

 

“Dear 102, 

Your dog has been barking every night for the past month in the early hours of morning.

Please silence your hound from hell!

Kind regards,

103”

 

Then she drew a picture of a little mouse looking exhausted and tired on the paper and showed Monty for his approval. 

“You don’t think insulting his dog is in bad taste?” Monty asked after he read over the note. “The mouse is cute, though. Very Clarke.”

“I want to be sure to get my message across how much I don’t like his dog’s barking,” she told him, shrugging her shoulders.

Seeing as he didn’t think she was going to redo her note, Monty gave her his blessing.

“Be right back,” she told him as she hurried back to her room to grab some tape. She then hurried out of their apartment over to her neighbors where she promptly taped the note onto his door before heading back into her own apartment. With any luck, this would be resolved by the next night.

 

* * *

The barking continue into the night, and Clarke got her customary few hours of sleep. Waking up more tired than when she went to bed, she trudged through her morning routine of getting ready for work at the clinic. As she left her apartment, she noticed a note taped to it, and it was from her neighbor. A glance told her he hadn’t liked her note. 

The note depicted a stick figure weilding a sword at her mouse. It was crudely drawn, her neighbor either not taking the time or having the patience to put much effort into the drawing. Either way, Clarke glanced up at the note he had scrawled at the top:

 

“103,

I think it’s all the marijuana smoke coming from your apartment that’s waking and baking them.

Buzz off,

102”

 

Clarke frowned. Monty did like to smoke a joint with their friend Jasper whenever the two got together. She hadn’t realized how often they must be doing it. Not that it mattered to Clarke any. If they were smoking when she got home from a particularly trying day, she sometimes joined in. It wasn’t any different to her than if they cracked open beer instead. Marijuana was better than alcohol anyway. 

The problem was she hadn’t realized it was a problem. She wondered if any of her other neighbors found it an issue, too, but everyone just kept quiet. She tore down the note and went back into her apartment to write another note of her own. This time, she drew her mouse looking smugly at a poster nailed to a wall that stated: “Apartment Rules! No Big Dogs!”  Then she wrote:

 

“Trump card: observe the apartment’s 50 pound pet weight restriction!

Your dogs have broken the record!”

 

She knew technically Monty and her were breaking the rules, too. But maybe she could scare him into doing something about his dog. If her and Monty got kicked out, they could find another apartment pretty easily. Not that her neighbor couldn’t do the same for all she knew, but she thought she’d try and see what happened. 

Taping her not to his door, she hurried off to work.

For most of the day, she was able to forget about the weird note war that she had started with her neighbor, but as her shift ended, she found herself wondering if he’d seen her note and left her another one yet. As annoying as his dogs happened to be, she found herself looking forward to what might await her back at her apartment. Though, she wasn’t looking forward to having to tell Monty he needed to smoke out on the patio instead of in the apartment so much.

Trudging up the stairwell, her legs exhausted from running around all day at the clinic, she found there was indeed another note left for her from her neighbor. This time, he’d d drawn his stick figure a little more detailed; he included muscles, a striped shirt, and a baseball cap with Spain’s soccer team Valencia’s logo on the front of it. The guy was holding a poster that said “Apartment rules! NO WEED!”

Frowning, she couldn’t believe he was a fan of Valencia’s soccer team just like her and her friends were. Most everyone else she knew that liked Spain liked Barcelona or Madrid. Her neighbor couldn’t be all bad if he liked Valencia. Maybe she’d been a bit premature in her judgement.

Sighing, she grabbed the note and unlocked her apartment door, moving inside. Walking into the living room, she found Monty and Jasper playing video games. “Guys, we gotta talk,” she told them as she went through the living room, down the hall, and into her room to put her purse and bag away. She emerged from her room and plopped down between the boys on the couch.

“Are you breaking up with us?” Jasper asked, feigning sadness. 

Monty had paused the game and was giving Clarke an incredulous look. “No one ever has a pleasant conversation after those words.”

She smiled at them. “As you know, the neighbor’s dog has been a bit irritating lately.”

“A bit? You’ve used much more colorful words than that, my friend,” Monty said. “I mean, you told him his dogs were the hounds from hell.”

She nodded with a cringe. “True. And I left him that note detailing my feelings on the matter. This morning, he replied with this,” she pulled the first note he had left her from her pocket and handing it to Monty, who then handed it to Jasper.

“I wouldn’t give him any points for creativity.”

“I think you guys need to cut down on the weed smoking, or go smoke on the patio, or figure out a ventilation system. We’re just as big of a problem as that dog if we don’t do anything to change when asked,” she told them both as she knew Jasper was the bigger instigator. “I don’t care that you guys do it, you know that. I just don’t want to be making our neighbors feel uncomfortable.”

Monty nodded, “I guess that’s fair. It’d be hypocritical if you expected your neighbor to change if you didn’t also do something to change the thing he complained about, too.”

“Exactly. So can you both promise to either go out on the patio or do it more at Jasper’s?” she asked them both.

They nodded in agreement. 

Satisfied, Clarke pulled out the last note she’d just found from her neighbor. “On to the next bit of good news.” She handed over the note. “He’s a Valencia fan!”

“Dude, no way!” Jasper reached for the note and smiled appreciatively. “Oh, man! We need to invite him over to the game on Saturday!”

“What? No!” Clarke was surprised to say the least. “I mean, I just attacked this guy via note! I doubt he’d even want anything to do with us!” 

Monty shrugged, “You don’t know that. Maybe if we tell him we’re Valencia fans, too, it’ll change how he views us the same way it changed how you view him?” 

Clarke narrowed her eyes at him, “Maybe. I just feel like it’s too soon. The wounds will be too fresh.”

“Seize the day, Clarke Griffin. Come on, you can’t tell me you aren’t interested in figuring out more about this guy. Who he is, where that dog came from?” Monty told her.

“And ask how he scores so many different ladies!” Jasper piped in. 

“You said yourself he’s cute. Maybe he’s actually a really good guy?” Monty suggested.

“I feel like you’re trying to set me up,” Clarke said as she gets up from the couch, making her way into her room. Might as well do a peace offering. 

She heard Monty mumble something but didn’t catch what he said, but she heard Jasper chuckle. She scribbles a note and continues drawing her mouse holding a Valencia banner in one hand and a pizza in the other. Next to her feet is a dog bowl with dog treats in it. 

 

“Wait you’re a Valencia fan? 

Truce.

Wanna come to my place on Saturday to watch the game?

I’ll supply the pizza. 

You can even bring you hound from hell.”

 

She brought the note back out, and the boys approved, so she decided to just go put it on his door now. Seize the day, as Monty put it. She taped the note onto his door. She could hear his dog start barking just on the other side of the door, so she hurried back to her place. She didn’t want to get caught putting up the note. That’d be embarrassing. More embarrassing than Saturday was probably going to start off. If he even accepted. 

Back in the living room, she asked what the guys wanted to do for supper. “Pizza!” the exclaimed in unison. 

Not one to turn down pizza, she dialed the local pizza stop that was just down the street and placed their order. “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” she told them as she grabbed her purse from her room. 

As she went to leave her apartment, she nearly ran into someone. Startled, she glanced up, glad she didn’t scream. It was her neighbor. She enjoyed the particular shade of red his face had turned. “Can I help you?” she asked, her voice a little breathless. She stepped out into the hall, shutting the door behind her and noticed a piece of paper he had taped to the door. He had drawn his stick figure holding a 6 pack of bottled beer with a picture of his dog next to him with the words:

 

“I’ll bring the beer and the dog.

Go Valencia!”

“You accepted?” she asked, unable to hide the shock from her voice. She turned to face him, pulling the note off the door to really look at it. “I thought for sure you weren’t going to want anything to do with us.”

He nodded, “I thought about not coming, but I could always use more people in my life that are as big of Valencia fans as my sister and I are.” The embarrassment at getting caught was still fresh on his face, but the redness was going down. Now, he was just running his hand through his hair. Clarke’s eyes followed the movement intently.

“I’m Clarke,” she said as she held out her hand. “That way you can put a name to the illustrator behind the mouse.” 

“I’m Bellamy,” he chuckled as he accepted her hand, shaking it firmly. 

“I talked to my roommate about the pot smoke. I’m sorry if it’s been bothering you,” she told him, wanting him to know she took his complaint seriously.

“And I’ve been working with my dog, but I got him from the pound. He didn’t have a great background. I’ve enrolled him into obedience classes, but they don’t start until next week,” he told her.

“I’m sorry I attacked you via note on your door,” she finally said. “I didn’t actually expect you to reply to it.”

He smiled, “You called my dog the hound from hell. I wasn’t going to just let that slide.”

She grimaced. “Sorry about that. It was in the heat of the moment kind of thing, and I haven’t been getting a whole lot of sleep lately. I plead tiredness and crankiness.”

“I can understand your frustration. Just imagine how loud he must be inside the apartment,” he said, and Clarke did notice he had dark circles under his eyes she hadn’t noticed at first.

“Now I feel like a giant jerk,” she said, dropping her head and staring at her shoes. She notices he’s only in socks. 

“Only a little jerk,” he replied, and when she glances up at him, he’s smiling.

“Can we start over?” she asked, returning the smile.

“Of course,” he nodded. 

“Great!” she smiled. “We can start by hanging out on Saturday. You can meet my roommate and a couple of  our friends. You can bring your sister or whoever you want.”

“I’ll see you then.”

 

* * *

Saturday rolled around, and Clarke was hurrying through the apartment shortly before Bellamy was due to arrive. “Clarke, what are you doing?” her friend Raven, a goddess if Clarke ever saw one, came up behind her in the kitchen and watched as Clarke cleaned off the countertops.

“Just tidying up,” Clarke said, barely looking up.

“You know this guy probably doesn’t care that you’re bread’s sitting on the counter, right?” she told her. 

“We got off on the wrong foot, and I just want this second impression to be a good one,” Clarke confessed, finally satisfied that the counters were as tidy and clean as they were going to get. 

“Mhm,” Raven folded her arms across her chest.

“What?” Clarke frowned at her, washing her hands in the sink.

“Nothing,” Raven shrugged her shoulders and turns to go back into the living room. 

Clarke stared at the dark hair spilling down her friend’s back and wondered what that comment meant. Clearly, Raven thought something else was motivating Clarke to make a better impression with Bellamy. Sure, it’d be great if they could hit it off. But that didn’t mean she was expecting anything else. 

Sighing, she dried her hands on the dish towel and then folds it neatly through the oven handle before going back out to join her friends. Raven, Harper, and Lincoln were sitting on the floor next to the couch where Monty and Jasper were currently sprawled across. The apartment didn’t have a whole lot of sitting room, but it never bothered her or her friends. But she suddenly felt self-conscious of what Bellamy would think when they came in and saw how small it was for so many people. 

A knock on the door startled Clarke, and she hurried to grab it thinking it must be Bellamy and his friends. But it was only the pizza guy, delivering what Clarke had ordered. After she had grabbed the boxes, set them on the counter, and was reaching to hand the guy his tip, she caught sight of Bellamy coming down the hall. The delivery guy thanked her and headed down the hallway Bellamy and two other people were walking down. 

There was a beautiful young woman with him. She had dark hair, dark, bright eyes, and a disarming smile. The guy walking behind Bellamy seemed serious. He wore a leather jacket and his hair was hidden under a beanie. He didn’t smile, but that just seemed to be how he was, not a reflection of what he thought of her. She hoped. Bellamy turned his head back and said something to both companions, to which the girl nodded enthusiastically and the guy just nodded curtly.

As they neared, Clarke waved at them, “The pizza just got here, so you guys made good time.” She noticed Bellamy didn't go to his door to grab his dog. "No dog today?"

Bellamy smiled, “No, I decided to introduce you to him on a more one on one basis- it'll be easier for him.” They were now in front of her door. “Clarke, meet my sister Octavia and my friend Miller.”

“It’s nice to meet you guys. Come on in!” she moved out of their way to let them into the apartment. Closing the door behind them, Clarke led them back into the living room. “Let me introduce you to the gang.” As they entered the living room, all of her friends turned to stare. “Guys, this is Miller, Octavia, and Bellamy.” She pointed at each in turn. “That’s my roommate over there, Monty, and our friends Jasper, Lincoln, Harper, and Raven. The weirdest bunch of people you’ll ever meet.”

“Weird equals cool here,” Jasper piped in, waving them all over. 

“Make yourselves comfortable. I’ll bring in the pizza,” Clarke told them before she headed back into the kitchen to grab plates and the boxes. 

“I’ll help,” Bellamy offered as he followed her. “Thanks for inviting me and letting me bring reinforcements.” 

She smiled. “It only seemed fair. Besides, if you and I are going to be friends, it only stands to reason that our friends become friends. Two birds. One party.” 

Bellamy grinned at her, “I like your thinking.”

Clarke grabbed the plates and the beer that Bellamy had brought and points Bellamy towards the pizza. Placing everything on the coffee table, her friends dove in, devouring the food. Clarke sat on the floor and watched her friends interact with Bellamy and his friends. Everyone seemed to be getting along well together, but by the end of the night, Lincoln and Octavia had exchanged phone numbers and Monty and Miller had gotten rather chummy on the couch. Smiling to herself, she glanced over at Bellamy, who was sitting on the opposite side of the coffee table on the floor, and found him staring at her, a smile pulling at his lips, too. 

She pulled out her phone and waved it at him subtly. He nodded in understanding, and before he left to go back to his apartment, they exchanged phone numbers. She kissed him on the cheek goodbye, and they all planned on meeting up the next weekend for the next game. The more and more the two friend groups hung out, the more it became one friend group. Soon, Clarke, Raven, Harper, and Octavia hung out without the group. Clarke knew Monty was hanging out with Miller and Bellamy more, too. 

Clarke found herself hanging out with Bellamy just the two of them more often, too. She found his dog, Artemis, wasn’t so bad. The obedience classes were working, and the barking was becoming less and less frequent. She’d fall asleep curled up on Bellamy’s couch, his dog sprawled in her lap. It was her new normal.

One day, several months later, Clarke was sitting on Bellamy’s couch playing with Artemis. Bellamy was in the kitchen making them supper. Clarke had offered to help, but he had told her to keep Artemis company instead so the dog wouldn’t be underfoot. Clarke did as she was told as she preferred to play with a dog than to cook.

Bellamy came out of the kitchen, an apron tied around his hips covered in food stains, and all she could think about was how handsome he looked and how much she wanted to be here with him like this all the time. She’d discovered her feelings for Bellamy was much more intense than neighborly or even friendship a couple weeks after they started hanging out more regularly. 

He was so smart; he loved to argue with him. He was passionate about the things he loved: history, mythology, video games, cooking. He loved his sister and his friends fiercely. They had the same dry, dark sense of humor, and he was the first person she wanted to talk to whenever something good or bad happened. In such a short time, he’d completely taken over her life. She wasn’t completely sure if he felt the same way, but she knew he cared about her. She thought she was in love with him.

“You what?” Bellamy asked, his brows furrowing.

Mortified, Clarke, stood up, startling Artemis off of the couch. She hadn’t meant to say that last part out loud. He wasn’t supposed to know about her feelings. Not yet. Not until she was sure he felt the same way. What if she just ruined everything they’d built up until now? What if things slid back to the awkward stage? If she ruined the friendship, her friends would kill her.

“What?” she glanced up and saw Bellamy was walking towards her. “I, uh, I don’t, uh, know what I just said.” She was stepping around the coffee table to get past Bellamy and maybe bolt for the door so she could run back over into her room and hide under her covers for the rest of her life. 

He sidestepped and was suddenly right in front of her. He reached out to grab onto her wrists. Gently he rubbed soothing circles into the inside of her palm. “Clarke,” he breathed. “Look at me.” 

Taking a deep breath in, she did as he said. When she looked into his eyes, she didn’t see regret or worse: pity. Instead, she found his gaze to be steadying. 

“I think I love you, too,” he told her before he leaned down and placed his lips atop her own. 

Clarke was stunned, not sure why she was so surprised Bellamy might feel the same way about her that she did for him. It was a dream come true, really. She couldn’t believe it. But those were Bellamy’s lips on her own, his chest pressed tightly against hers, his neck she found her arms wrapping themselves around, his hair her fingers were tugging on. He was solid and real and hers.

She pushed up into him, deepening the kiss, trying to tug him closer to her so that there was nothing between them but their clothes. When she finally pulled away, she let Bellamy rest his forehead against hers. “I’ve been wanting to do that for too long,” she admitted.

She couldn’t see Bellamy smirk, but she knew he was. “How long?”

“Long enough.”

“Me, too.” 

She tilted her head up to look him in the eyes. “Really?” 

“Practically since we first met.”

“No way. We were note-fighting!”

“Who wouldn’t fall for a girl sending notes to a guy? I thought it was amusing. I thought this is a girl who’s got some spunk. And then you caught me putting up the last note, and I thought you were so pretty and and bright.” He shrugged. “It was history from there.”

Smiling, Clarke leaned up on her tiptoes to kiss him again. “I’m glad I sent you a passive aggressive note, then.”

“Me, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you guys liked this one! I saw the idea floating around Tumblr and just had to write it to fit Bellarke.
> 
> If you could take a moment to leave a comment and tell me what you think, I would love to hear from you! It's the best part of writing!  
> Kudos and subscriptions are cool, too! :)


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